


Balance of Emotions

by Melime



Category: Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: Episode Related, Episode: s01e14 Sleeping Dogs, F/F, Getting Together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-02
Updated: 2017-12-02
Packaged: 2019-02-09 12:33:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12887961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melime/pseuds/Melime
Summary: Something changed between Hoshi and T'Pol when they were on that ship.





	Balance of Emotions

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Português brasileiro available: [Equilíbrio de Emoções](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12887967) by [Melime GreenLeaf (Melime)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melime/pseuds/Melime%20GreenLeaf)



Hoshi had been an anxious child, her parents used to complain about that. She was always more anxious than people around her seemed to think was acceptable, even before joining Starfleet and having real cause to worry.

She didn’t mean to do it. It was simply a consequence of that mind of hers, always searching for patterns even when it seemed like there were none. A brain that earned the respect even of Vulcans, able to hear what others couldn’t and connect dots when even their most advanced computers said there was no connection.

Sometimes, it was just too much for her. Everything was too much, and the universe was both too big and too small, too loud and too quiet. It was part of what made her think she wasn’t cut out for space exploration, although in the end the temptation of learning more, having contact with new races, was too much to turn down. She was always curious, always hoping to learn more, excited for the possibility of going to distant places on Earth to work, so going on a mission of space exploration was the next logical step.

She figured it wouldn’t be as big of a deal. She thought that she could do it. She would be working onboard the ship, after all, just working like she would at a university or a distant base. She could do that, it was no problem. She wouldn’t give in to anxiety, wouldn’t allow it to take over her mind, because there was no cause for anxiety. And well, if she failed to do that, then it would be no different from all other times in her life. There was never too much of a problem in being a bit too anxious.

However, she couldn’t give herself the luxury of being anxious anymore. Things weren’t as she expected, weren’t as she had hoped. Lives depended on her ability to keep the chaos of her mind under control. They couldn’t trust the universal translator, so they needed her to be better, more trustworthy than the computers could be. A second of hesitation, a minimal mistake, it was all it took for someone to pay the ultimate price, maybe even all of them. It was too much resting on her shoulders, but everyone had too many expectations lurking over them, so she had no other choice but to raise to the challenge or get them all killed.

If only it was as easy as knowing what needed to be done.

\---

T’Pol was somewhat wrong. It was a… not a feeling, that would be a human way to look at things, but an impression, an impression that she could never quite shake. She was the wrong kind of Vulcan, or perhaps not Vulcan enough, if such an idea wasn’t ridiculous in and of itself. Especially because what gave her that impression was, at least in part, her adherence to those same principles that all Vulcans claimed to follow.

Infinite diversity in infinite combinations, it was as close to a lie as a Vulcan could get, in the sense that not only it was untruthful, but also that claiming to live by this concept while believing themselves to be better than everyone else, above all other species in a certain way, was illogical and didn’t serve a greater purpose.

She didn’t want to think of her own people, and herself by extension, as hypocrites, but the more she stayed away from them, the more she strayed from the path that was laid in front of her during her entire life, the more she could see beyond the façade they kept even among themselves.

It wasn’t something she was willing to admit, not even to herself on some level, but all that contributed to that overall aura of displacement. The more she stayed among the humans, the clearer it became that, although she didn’t belong with them, she didn’t belong with her own kind either.

Maybe this was why her people always stayed somewhat isolationist, despite all their efforts of space exploration. Maybe they knew that living with other races would send them in a path that could only end in loneliness and displacement. Maybe that was what made humans different, that they could adapt to other ways of life without turning into a being that wouldn’t fit anywhere in the universe.

However, it was too late to be concerned. Whatever change was inflicted upon her over her period aboard Enterprise was long since settled. It would be illogical to concern herself over something that could not be stopped. Things were as they were, she was who she was, and once her time with the humans that had already gotten used to her ways came to an end, she would be set adrift in a universe that had no place for the likes of her.

\---

Hoshi wanted to confront her fears. No, she _needed_ to confront them. She was there now, and she wanted to stay, and the only way for her to stay was to become tougher. At times things would be demanded of her, and failing wouldn’t be an option, so she had to get used to it. Which was why she asked to board that ship.

The environmental suits terrified her, she felt as if she would suffocate inside them, even though that was mostly the claustrophobia talking, and the only way to get used to them was using them. A little bit of exposition therapy that would probably be more efficient taking as a base an away mission that wouldn’t end catastrophically if she couldn’t concentrate enough, but was still interesting enough to catch her attention.

Of course, knowing that T’Pol had asked for her added an unexpected layer of pressure. Of course she didn’t want to disappoint the Captain, and she wouldn’t have asked to join this mission if she wasn’t fairly sure that she could keep her anxieties under control, but she admired T’Pol, admired her intelligence and how calm and level-headed she was, and she couldn’t imagine how humiliating it would be to panic right next to her when it was T’Pol herself who had requested her presence. T’Pol believed that she could be valuable to this mission, so she couldn’t let her down.

If she had known how bad things would get, maybe she wouldn’t have volunteered. But then again, hindsight would also tell her that she was more capable than she thought she was, and that her knowledge was indispensable to bring them back safely.

\---

When T’Pol asked the Captain to bring Hoshi with her to the ship, he tried to dissuade her. He was certain she wouldn’t want to go, and with no imminent threat that could only be prevented by her presence on that ship, there wouldn’t be any way to convince her to go against her instincts.

He was wrong, of course, and T’Pol knew that, or she wouldn’t have asked. She saw how Hoshi was improving, and she knew Hoshi would enjoy a chance like this. However, there was still a logical reason behind her reasoning, that Hoshi’s work as a translator would be necessary aboard the ship.

\---

“Are you all right?” T’Pol asked, and although there was no emotion in her voice, there was something almost like concern, or as close to concern as it could come from a Vulcan.

Hoshi sat down. She tried to avoid this for as long as she could, but there was no use denying that she was scared, anxious, terrified. She asked to be on this mission and now they could all die, and she couldn’t even keep a clear head. They needed her to help them figure out a way to fix this ship, and she could barely think, too taken by her own fears. The fact that even T’Pol could notice that and was concerned about her, or probably about her capability of completing her tasks, only made things worse.

“I promised myself I wouldn’t do this,” she confessed, almost without meaning to. She thought she had left this behind, she thought she had what it took to be in this kind of mission.

“You are in a dangerous situation in an alien environment. Your anxiety is understandable.”

A Vulcan telling her that her feelings were understandable! She must have really looked like she was about to fall apart, for T’Pol to talk to her like this.

“Don’t you mean, for a human?” It was perhaps meaner than she meant to, but she couldn’t help but despise her inability to keep her feelings under control.

“You can’t deny your nature.”

But she wished she could, at least in times like these. “This may sound strange but I envy you sometimes.” And now she was blabbing. “I know, another pesky human emotion, but there are times I wish I could just ignore my feelings. Bury them the way Vulcans do.” She didn’t know why she was saying this, and she was probably making things worse, but once she started she couldn’t stopped.

“Take my hand.”

She couldn’t have heard that right, Vulcans don’t touch, unless it’s absolutely necessary. “Excuse me?”

T’Pol kneeled in front of her, and for a moment Hoshi wonder if she was hallucinating from the fumes, or if maybe the ship had exploded and this was a fabrication of her brain in the fraction of second between the explosion and her actual death.

“My hand,” T’Pol repeated, and Hoshi was suddenly aware that that was real. “Close your eyes.”

She obeyed, not knowing what else to do. She felt T’Pol’s fingers on her palm, and a shiver down her spine. The touch was delicate, barely there, but it still made her breath caught.

“Think of yourself on a turbulent ocean. You have the power to control the waves.” T’Pol’s voice was as soft as her caress, and it made Hoshi feel something she didn’t want to think about, couldn’t give herself the luxury of thinking about, not then at least.

“Whatever it is you’re trying to do, it’s not working.” It wouldn’t work, the anxiety and the fear were still there, but now accompanied by whatever it was that T’Pol’s touch made her feel.

T’Pol shifted her fingers, and the outside world seemed to progressively lose importance.

“Focus. The waves are subsiding. The water is growing still. You are in control.”

It was true. She allowed T’Pol to guide her away from all that made her uncomfortable, all that kept her from being able to give the best of herself. She didn’t know how that worked, but it didn’t matter, and she didn’t care enough to think about that. She was too in awe of the power that T’Pol showed over her mind.

“That was amazing,” she said, only noticing the words after they left her mouth.

“When we return to the ship, I’ll teach you how to do it on your own.”

“Thanks.” She didn’t know what else to say, didn’t know how to properly thank T’Pol for calming the storm in her mind, didn’t know what to make of the moment they were having.

Then the ship jolted and the moment was over. They had their own lives to save.

“Lieutenant Reed, report,” T’Pol said over the comm, her Vulcan façade back in place.

Hoshi wondered when she would see that other side of T’Pol again.

\---

T’Pol wasn’t bothered by the fact that they might die. It was a possibility she was aware of when signing on to this mission, and so it was pointless to fear the likelihood of an outcome that was always weighted as a possible result. Vulcans didn’t fear death, even as they tried to avoid it, when possible. And in this case, there was still a possibility of avoiding death.

However, she was dealing with humans, so perhaps she should have noticed before that it wouldn’t be as easy for them as it was for her.

“Are you all right?” she asked, finally noticing how the situation was affecting Hoshi.

Hoshi sat down, looking vulnerable and afraid.

“I promised myself I wouldn’t do this.” She sounded defeated, as if her feelings were a personal failure.

“You are in a dangerous situation in an alien environment. Your anxiety is understandable.” Maybe she wouldn’t have thought so, in the past, but T’Pol was learning a lot with the humans.

“Don’t you mean, for a human?”

T’Pol wasn’t expecting for that, she didn’t believe she acted as if humans were inherently inferior, just different. “You can’t deny your nature.”

“This may sound strange but I envy you sometimes. I know, another pesky human emotion, but there are times I wish I could just ignore my feelings. Bury them the way Vulcans do.”

‘No, you don’t,’ T’Pol thought, most species she knew of wouldn’t be satisfied with the Vulcan way of dealing with emotion, and it was certainly not right for humans. But explaining that would be of no help, and she needed to help Hoshi.

“Take my hand,” she said, for lack of better ideas. She never did this to someone else, but a simpler form of guided meditation wouldn’t work in Hoshi’s current state of mind. Hoshi needed to be grounded somehow, and T’Pol was her only alternative.

“Excuse me?” Hoshi said.

They couldn’t lose any more time, and she wasn’t sure she would be able to explain what she was trying to do, so T’Pol simply kneeled in front of Hoshi.

“My hand. Close your eyes.”

She placed three fingers on Hoshi’s palm, just enough contact to help guide her.

“Think of yourself on a turbulent ocean. You have the power to control the waves.”

She could sense Hoshi’s panic. That Hoshi had been able to function up to that point being terrified as she was impressive.

“Whatever it is you’re trying to do, it’s not working.”

T’Pol shifted her fingers, projecting her concentration.

“Focus. The waves are subsiding. The water is growing still. You are in control.”

It was working, she could sense that Hoshi was calmer. Not completely, it would be hard, if not impossible, for a human to be completely calm under such circumstances. Nor was it necessary. The gift of humanity was working with their emotions, not despite them. It was something T’Pol was learning about them, even though it wasn’t an alternative for Vulcans, the Vulcan primal nature was violent, and through the careful control of emotion they were able to overcome that nature before destroying themselves, but that was the path they took, and it couldn’t be changed, even if humanity seemed to have found another way.

“That was amazing.”

A human would have smiled then, to offer her comfort. T’Pol couldn’t do that, so she had to offer a different kind of comfort.

“When we return to the ship, I’ll teach you how to do it on your own.”

A bridge, perhaps, between the free flowing human emotions and the Vulcan control.

“Thanks.”

The ship jolted again, they both had more pressing issues that demanded their attention.

“Lieutenant Reed, report,” she called over the comm, all professionalism and no distress.

\---

They were rescued, and that was it. All her panic and fear would soon turn into the memory of just another mission, buried under new traumas. Out there, farther away from home than any other Earth vessel had ever been, there wasn’t time to allow traumatic events to settle. One near death experience was replaced with another until they became so commonplace it was no longer cause for trauma.

Hoshi hoped that she would get used to it someday, preferably soon. At least now she could say the environmental suits didn’t bother her all that much, which was some sort of progress. She wished there was a way for her to tell her parents about all of this without transferring her excess anxiety to them. They would be proud of her.

She had forgotten about T’Pol’s offer in the middle of their crisis, and by the time they were back on the Enterprise, the memory was sent far away from her mind never to return, buried under reports and new assignments.

If T’Pol hadn’t approached her, weeks after the incident, Hoshi would probably never have thought about that again. When T’Pol asked her if she had any further success with her meditation, and if she needed any help, Hoshi actually needed a moment to remember what she was referring to, but there was no hesitation when she said she would love to have T’Pol’s help again. She almost added that she didn’t want to impose and would only accept this if T’Pol was sure Hoshi wouldn’t be bothering her, but held her tongue just in time, remembering that a Vulcan wouldn’t make an offer like this just to be kind, so her wish to help was as genuine as it could be.

She was always eager to learn, and the opportunity to learn how to meditate directly from a Vulcan would be tempting even if she wasn’t in desperate need of dealing with her anxiety issues.

\---

At first, T’Pol waited for Hoshi to seek her help. The offer had been made, and would be fulfilled when there was time. However, as the time passed, it became clear that Hoshi wouldn’t approach her, either because she wouldn’t want to bother T’Pol or because she was too busy and forgot about it, with humans, it was sometimes hard to know their motivations.

As much as they accused Vulcans of being duplicitous, it was at times easier to understand warp theory than it was to find the true meaning of what was being said and done behind all those human social niceties. It was still truly a challenge to understand humans, even if she were learning considerably by observation. Perhaps, even if she were to dedicate the considerable decades she had left to live to fraternizing with humans, learning about the way they think and how it influences or contradicts the way they act, she would still be left with unknowns.

However, as interesting as it was, this exercise with Hoshi wasn’t about furthering her knowledge of the human psyche. T’Pol had worked alongside Vulcan translators and operated the universal translator enough times to know that Ensign Hoshi Sato was an essential asset to Enterprise and that they needed her working at peak efficiency. With her, the odds of a successful first contact increased exponentially, so it was in the best interest of the mission if T’Pol could help keep her calm so she would be able to take full advantage of her knowledge and pattern recognition capabilities.

It was only logical then that T’Pol would help her learn some simple meditation techniques. She had meant what she said on the Klingon ship, anxiety and fear were understandable for a human faced with uncertainty in a life or death situation, but that didn’t mean that those feelings should be allowed to wreak havoc inside her mind. There was a middle ground to be found between not having or suppressing emotions and allowing oneself to be completely controlled by emotion driven primal instincts that humanity had done little to shake since separating from its closest evolutionary relative.

\---

Hoshi’s sessions with T’Pol weren’t as she was expecting. There was something missing that the lack of a Klingon ship falling apart around them with each jolt counting the moments left until their deaths couldn’t account for.

There was a certain… intimacy, perhaps. Even as a linguist she struggled to put into words what was the moment that they shared there. Some things were better left undescribed, indescribable even. That moment was one of those things, to be cherished and remembered, but never truly explained. Or perhaps the mixture of believing she was going to die and then the relief of being able to think clearly and seeing that there was still hope for their survival made her paint the memory with the sweet colors of nostalgia.

Still, she felt she understood something then. Something about Vulcans that years of study could never have told her. T’Pol noticed her distress and acted kindly towards her. T’Pol’s actions may have been logical - in fact they most certainly were, even under the effects of hallucinogens and extremely ill there was always a logic to everything T’Pol did, even if that logic was only internal - but there were other ways to make Hoshi focus, and she chose the one that was rooted in emotion, even ignoring the Vulcan touching taboo to do so.

From where she was standing, T’Pol’s reaction to her distress had been nearly emotional, even thought it was coated in a healthy protective layer of practicality as an excuse. It made Hoshi want to know more about what was going on inside T’Pol’s head, although she had always wanted that on some level.

These training sessions would be the perfect opportunity to learn not only with her but about her. The only problem was that whatever they shared aboard that ship was over, and Hoshi didn’t know if she could get that back, she didn’t even know if it existed at all or was it amplified by her mind’s momentary need to launch on to something for support.

They would sit, T’Pol would verbally guide her through creating a calming mental image, they would remain sited in silence for any length of time that T’Pol considered appropriate, and then she would leave.

It was all very simple, professional even, with a level of detachment that only Vulcans could truly achieve. And it couldn’t be farther away from what she wanted, what she expected when T’Pol first made the offer on the Klingon ship.

\---

“Is there something wrong?” T’Pol asked during one of their sessions, noticing Hoshi was having a harder time concentrating on their meditation than she would normally show.

“I…” Hoshi started, seeming to have been caught by surprise. “No, nothing’s wrong. I guess my mind is just wandering today.”

“Is there something I could do to help you?” T’Pol offered, although she never particularly understood the human mind propensity to wander.

Hoshi shook her head. “No, I’m sorry. I’ll try harder. I think I just have too much on my mind lately.”

“The meditation is meant to help with that, but if you believe you are too distracted to continue today, perhaps we should continue on another night.”

“No, it’s fine, there’s no need to do that. I suppose learning how to clear my mind would be good for this type of situation too. I’ve always had too much on my mind, I don’t know how my parents could stand that before I started dedicating myself to my studies. I guess there really is something to this Vulcan mental discipline.”

“It benefits us, and it can at times be of benefit for other species.” Not all of them, much to the dismay of most Vulcans, but again, most Vulcans didn’t appreciate diversity nearly as much as they claimed to.

“Can I ask you something?”

T’Pol nodded her head slightly. “Of course.”

“Why are you helping me?”

T’Pol almost asked for clarification, before settling on a slightly different approach. “You don’t want me to help you?”

“No! Of course I want your help, I just don’t understand _why_.”

‘Why’ was meaning, justification, motivation. But her own motivation seemed clear and logical to her, so T’Pol didn’t understand the reason behind Hoshi’s questioning.

“Should I not be helping you?”

“No, that’s not it. It’s just… I understand why you helped me on the Klingon ship. I wasn’t focused enough to do what I needed to do to make sure we got out of there alive, we all had to work together and if you hadn’t helped me then maybe I wouldn’t have been able to do my part. So you helped me for the good of the mission, I get it, it’s logical. But I don’t understand why you are still helping me now, I don’t get why you would even offer to help me when we got back here.”

“That is incorrect, that is not why I helped you then,” T’Pol said, even though it wasn’t strictly true. The good of the mission had weighed on her decision, but it wasn’t the only reason, or even the main reason why she helped Hoshi find calm when she was distressed.

“What? Why did you help me then?”

“You were suffering, and I knew a way of decreasing your suffering. It was only logical that I would help you to the extent of my capability.” T’Pol wasn’t entirely convinced of her own answer, which was a new experience for her.

“That’s…” Hoshi started, her voice breaking with emotion, “that’s beautiful.”

“I don’t see why this would have any particular aesthetic value.” It wasn’t quite a joke, but something close to it, an attempt to alleviate the unknown emotion now threatening to take Hoshi. She knew it was just an expression, but also knew that humans at times found the Vulcan literal understanding of words to be funny.

Hoshi giggled. “If I had said what you did was sweet, would you have told me it had no taste?”

“Actions do not, in fact, have a taste.”

Suddenly, Hoshi shifted to a serious expression. “Thank you. For everything. I tried to face my fears but on some level they have held me back, and I don’t want to let this happen anymore. I’m ready to face all my fears and anxieties and what you’re teaching me helps. You didn’t have to do any of this and I appreciate all the time you’re dedicating to help me.”

T’Pol didn’t know what to reply to that. “Shall we attempt the meditation again?” she asked, trying to move the subject away from the unknown territory of emotions.

Hoshi smiled. “Sure. I think I can concentrate better now, I just had to get this off my mind.”

“Very well. Imagine you are the wind blowing in a violent storm.”

\---

After hearing about T’Pol’s motivation to help her, Hoshi couldn’t help but wonder about what that meant. Hoshi considered T’Pol her friend, although she hadn’t exactly considered if the opposite was also true, not until they had that conversation. After hearing T’Pol talk like that, especially knowing so much about the way Vulcans communicated, it was hard not to think that T’Pol cared about her on some level.

Working closely with T’Pol since boarding the Enterprise already taught her that there was more about Vulcan feelings than what met the eye. It was obvious there were things she cared about, and that she wasn’t simply following orders, not even from her superiors back on Vulcan.

The more she thought about this, the more convinced she became that T’Pol cared about her. From there on, it was just a matter of almost subconsciously wondering about the nature of those feelings, until the answer became clear.

\---

If T’Pol’s peers could see her now, if they could know what happened in the depths of her mind far beyond what she herself could easily access, they would blame her time with the humans for the confusion she experiencing now. Vulcans didn’t experience confusion with regards to their actions and motivations, so the only possible origin for this was her contact with humans.

If her mind was prone to wandering, she would perhaps wonder if she had lost herself in the middle of this human ship or if maybe she had finally found herself after decades of discomfort in not belonging. However, Vulcan minds don’t wander, and so hers didn’t.

\---

Hoshi was brilliant at picking up patterns, understanding things that perhaps no one else would, absorbing every bit of random information until she could see a clear picture. It was no wonder she was the one to figure it out, to understand her own feelings as well as T’Pol’s before the other had even formulated an hypothesis to understand them.

She decided to say something after one of their meditation sessions. She was nearly at the door when she stopped, closing her eyes for a moment and drawing a deep breath. T’Pol’s calming techniques were really helpful in a time like this. She turned and walked until she was facing T’Pol, close enough to touch her.

“I know there’s something you aren’t telling me, and it took me awhile to get it, but I think now I know what it is. And I wanted you to know it’s fine, I don’t mind waiting until you want to talk about it, if you want to talk about it.” Not exactly her most eloquent speech, but meditation would only help her with _some_ of the anxiety.

T’Pol looked at her in a way that Hoshi had come to learn meant she would have smiled if she were human. “You are extremely perceptive.” She moved one hand slightly, then touched the back of Hoshi’s hand with two fingers, caressing it softly. Hoshi shivered, but didn’t move away. “Perhaps we should reconvene earlier tomorrow to discuss this.”

Hoshi blinked slowly once, surprised by the swift response, then she smiled, relaxing. “Yes, I would like that, I would like a lot.”

\---

T’Pol wasn’t sure how she had gotten to this point. Perhaps the greatest disadvantage of centuries of evolution towards controlling one’s emotion was how difficult it was to recognize her own mostly suppressed feelings. Maybe she would have never reached a conclusion alone, but she wasn’t alone. Hoshi was a kind and patient person who would never judge T’Pol for acting according to her own nature.

Acceptance, it was something she had searched for for longer than she knew, and now it was finally within her reach, even if not as she expected, but in the form of a human. It was too soon to know if this was where she would find the place she belonged to, but it was a start. The first of many steps.

Happiness wasn’t a concept explored by her people, but there was contentment, and she was content.


End file.
